In 23 days, American citizens will go to the polls and elect a President, Senators, and more. Government is appointed by God to rule us and bring justice to our land, so we need those officials. But even more than needing Presidents, Senators, and mayors, I propose we need a king. We need a monarchy. One ruler to rule us with justice, righteousness, and peace. And I have a name to propose for that king: Jesus. Scriptures promise us that Jesus the King is coming. And when he comes, he will establish a kingdom on the earth.
Our passage this morning is in the Gospel of Mark, chapter 4. One of two major themes in this chapter is the coming kingdom of God.
Mark 4:21-25 Pay Attention
We will begin in Mark 4:21. Last week, we looked at the Parable of the Sower. In today’s text, Jesus continues with some related themes.
Mark 4:21–25 (CSB)
21 He also said to them, “Is a lamp brought in to be put under a basket or under a bed? Isn’t it to be put on a lampstand?
22 For there is nothing hidden that will not be revealed, and nothing concealed that will not be brought to light.
23 If anyone has ears to hear, let him listen.”
24 And he said to them, “Pay attention to what you hear. By the measure you use, it will be measured to you—and more will be added to you.
25 For whoever has, more will be given to him, and whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him.”
By looking at the context of the entire chapter, the light from the lamp in vs. 21-22 is speaking of the unveiling of the kingdom of God. For centuries in biblical history, the prophets have been pointing to a coming kingdom with a Messiah, an Anointed One. Much about this Messiah was known and understood from the prophets, but there was still some of it that was concealed. How would it all play out? Who actually is this Messiah who is going to come and establish God’s kingdom on earth?
Jesus is saying, “What was concealed is now revealed.” The coming kingdom is now revealed in Jesus. In John’s Gospel account, chapter 8, we can read that Jesus declares himself to be the Light of the world.
Then in vs. 23 we get to a main point of the entire chapter: Hear. Listen. “If anyone has ears to hear, let him listen.” 10 times in this chapter, Jesus tells the people, “Listen to what I say.”
When we see the word, “Hear,” what do we think it means? When you were growing up, and your mother said to you, “Did you hear me?”, do you think she meant merely, “Are your ears damaged? Do we need to take you to an audiologist and have a hearing test?” No, of course not. When Mom or Dad ask, “Did you hear me?”, they mean, “Are you paying attention? And are you going to respond to me and obey me? Or are you going to ignore me?”
In that sense, Jesus is asking….no, commanding…the people in Chapter 4 to pay attention to his words. To not ignore him and disobey him. To respond. To believe.
And then in vs. 24 he says it again: “Pay attention to what you hear.” The lamp is being revealed. The Light of the world has come. So LISTEN. Pay attention.
WHY? What is the outcome of either paying attention to or ignoring Jesus
Vs. 24: “By whatever measure you use, it will be measured to you.” This same truth is stated at least eight times in the NT, so this emphasis tells us something.
What does he mean? Jesus is saying, if you respond to my truth, if you listen to me, if you pay attention, if you trust me and love me, then you will receive even more. The light of understanding will grow brighter. But if you ignore me and walk in unbelief and disobey me, then even the understanding you have of me will be taken away. The light of understanding will grow darker. The dimmer switch will be turned down.
Another way to say this is that hearts that are soft, humble, and faith-filled hearts will grow softer. But those hearts that are hard, proud, and unbelieving will grow even harder. In a way, this is part of God’s reward and judgment on the earth. We all are receiving what we truly want and what we deserve.
And it’s why Jesus spoke in parables: to reveal more to those who hunger for it, and to take away the truth from those who refuse to hear. This message from Jesus to hear him was of utmost importance to the people in that first century. And that message to listen is just as important today. Our very lives depend upon our response to Jesus.
So how does this relate to us today Listen!
Very simply, Jesus, the Light of the world, is calling on each one of us to listen to him. To pay attention to everything he says. To respond to his call. To seek his forgiveness. To eagerly obey his voice. Each of us must respond to Jesus’ call to his kingship. The message of this chapter and the NT is that Jesus is the King of this world. And he is the King of our hearts.
A kingship is not a democracy. On November 5th, American citizens will vote one of two people into the office of the President. The majority will choose who our ruler is.
In Jesus’ kingdom, you and I won’t vote Him into office or out of it. No votes are needed. No votes are allowed. He simply is king. He will have his way. Right now, today, at this hour, Jesus calls each one of us to hear him. To listen. To pay attention. And to respond.
Even this morning, truth is being laid out before us all in this sermon, in our songs, and in our prayers. How are we responding to it?
For some of us, we are just beginning to seek to understand Christianity. We are seeking to grasp who Jesus really is. To those of us in that position, Jesus calls us…commands us…to hear him. To respond. To submit to him as our King. To yield to his authority. To welcome him into our hearts, and so find eternal life. But if we ignore Jesus…if we don’t LISTEN as he commanded…we are at risk of losing the little bit of light we already see. We are at risk of a growing hardness towards God.
For others of us, we believe in Jesus. We’ve walked with him for many months and even many years. We have listened. We have believed. And like vs. 11 (from last week) says, “The secret of the kingdom of God has been given to you.” What a privilege we have been given. What grace God has shown. We want to keep walking with that same spirit. To respond to Jesus every day. Listen to Him. It’s a challenge to keep that humble heart, isn’t it??
I was at a conference last week. The content of the music and teachings were excellent. All the external things were in place. But I still had to wrestle with my heart. A couple of times during some teachings, instead of responding humbly to the messages spoken from the Word, I was tempted to critique the speakers. To consider how I would have shared the same truths. I was in a wrestling match in my soul: Would I critique and miss out, or would I humble myself and listen to Jesus in the proclamation of his words?
To all of us, when we hear truth about God and his Son, do we receive it? Are we hungry for it?
When we come here Sunday morning, have we prepared our hearts to listen, sing, worship, and obey our King? Or are we mindlessly showing up? At home every day, do we read our Bibles, or do we ignore Jesus? When we discuss the Bible with our friends in our Community Groups or Bible studies, are we seeking to know, understand, and obey the One who spoke it?
Ten times in this chapter, Jesus calls us to hear. To listen with responsive hearts and minds. Our King is calling us!
May we seek the King and find him, for he is not far from each one of us.
Mark 4:26-34 The Kingdom
Now let’s read the remainder of our passage for this morning.
26 “The kingdom of God is like this,” he said. “A man scatters seed on the ground.
27 He sleeps and rises night and day; the seed sprouts and grows, although he doesn’t know how.
28 The soil produces a crop by itself—first the blade, then the head, and then the full grain on the head.
29 As soon as the crop is ready, he sends for the sickle, because the harvest has come.”
30 And he said, “With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable can we use to describe it?
31 It’s like a mustard seed that, when sown upon the soil, is the smallest of all the seeds on the ground.
32 And when sown, it comes up and grows taller than all the garden plants, and produces large branches, so that the birds of the sky can nest in its shade.”
33 He was speaking the word to them with many parables like these, as they were able to understand.
34 He did not speak to them without a parable. Privately, however, he explained everything to his own disciples.
What are parables?
First, let’s talk about parables in general. What are they?
In short, parables are “earthly stories with heavenly meanings.” Simple, earthly stories involving seeds, soil, people, and more…stories that make bigger, eternal, and heavenly truths.
And as Pastor Luke looked at last week and as vs. 24-25 emphasize, Jesus deliberately spoke in parables because of the condition of the heart. The humble and hungry would understand more. The proud and the hardened would understand less.
Like vs. 24, “By the measure you use, it will be measured to you.”
Basically everyone gets what they truly want.
Now let’s talk specifically about these two parables. Both are about the kingdom of God.
So what is the kingdom of God?
For many years, this term confused me. It seemed vague and undefined. But I made it more complicated than it needs to be. To put it in simplest terms, the kingdom of God is wherever he is King. In the ultimate and eternal sense, God has always been King. Lord of all. Sovereign Ruler of all things. The High King of heaven. The King of kings.
Centuries before this and throughout the OT, God was declared King. One example,
Psalm 10:16 CSB The Lord is King forever and ever….
God has always been King. The King over heaven and earth. And the King over the souls of men and women. You and me. Even if we hate him, he is still King over us. Yesterday, today, and forever. Here in Mark, Jesus is speaking in more specific terms about the kingdom, including new things that are happening and are still to come.
Back in chapter 1, in the first recorded words of Jesus, Mark writes,
Mark 1:14–15 CSB After John was arrested, Jesus went to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God: “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!”
Jesus says there is good news. There is “the gospel.” The good news is something new. “The time is fulfilled.” Something new is happening.
What is this new thing? “The kingdom of God has come near.” The kingdom is upon us.
And how are we to respond to this good news of the kingdom of God coming? “Repent and believe the good news about the kingdom of God.”
Now let’s get more specific. Throughout the Gospel of Mark, Jesus is unveiling this kingdom of God. He is revealing—unveiling—something that will change human history. And this unveiling reaches a mountaintop when Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is crucified for the sins of the world, but then raised from the dead and ascends into heaven to be crowned King over the earth.
God the Father has given his Son authority over the nations and over every human heart. So Jesus is king NOW. The kingdom of God is NOW. Today.
Yet Jesus ascended into heaven and resides there, not on earth, so the kingdom isn’t here YET, at least not in full.
Many have described this as, “NOW but NOT YET.” Jesus is King NOW. But he’s NOT YET King in all his fullness.
There is more is to come…because Jesus Christ has promised to return to earth a second time, and when he does, he will be formally and fully crowned King over us. And he will establish his kingdom in heaven and on earth with completeness and finality. Every knee will bow before him, in heaven and on earth. He will deal with his enemies, including death, and his kingdom will be fully established.
This is the hope of every Christ follower: the fullness of the kingdom of Jesus Christ. This is the good news. The gospel. This is what every person on earth is called to respond to. “The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news.”
First parable (vs. 26-29):
In this first parable, Jesus says the kingdom is going to grow slowly and mysteriously. I’m fascinated by the thought, “It grows, but the man doesn’t know how.” It’s like gardening. Plant growth fascinates me. We place a seed in the ground, and it simply grows. I marvel at the simplicity of it. A plant’s growth is like magic.
Sure, you biologists and horticulturists can explain the science behind it, but that still doesn’t explain the mystery of life. The tiny, insignificant seed simply dies in the ground and grows into something magnificent. The kingdom of God grows like that seed. His kingdom expands. And like the man in the parable, we can’t really explain it.
And eventually the whole point of the seed planting is harvest. God is the harvester, and people are the harvest in the final judgment. For the kingdom of God is primarily about God and people. Those who love him. Who have heard…listened….and responded to him. Those who hate him. Who have ignored and rejected him. There will be a harvest in the final judgment.
Second parable (vs. 30-32):
In the second parable about a mustard seed, Jesus says the kingdom of God will begin very small. Like a tiny seed. But it will eventually become huge, and birds of the air will nest in its shade.
What does Jesus mean? The kingdom of God will start very small. Obscurely. Think of what actually happened 2000 years ago. One man named Jesus comes into the world in a very obscure way in a small town called Bethlehem in a small part of the world. Though he becomes famous in the land called Judea, to the bulk of the world he is entirely unknown. Even his death and resurrection will largely be unknown to the world at that time.
So the kingdom begins as just a very small plant. Seemingly insignificant.
But eventually, this gospel of the kingdom of God will impact “the birds of the sky”. Jesus is speaking with the language from several OT references, including Ezekiel 17. His point is, the kingdom will impact the world. And this is precisely what he later commands his disciples to do: to broadcast this message of the kingdom to the world, and make disciples (followers) of him.
We see the fruit of this parable in this room. The world is being impacted. On a typical Sunday morning, we have about 25 nations represented, including the United States (which is on the other side of the world from Jerusalem. 6000 miles from where this all began). And we know of many other testimonies to this worldwide impact of the kingdom: A friend of mine left with his wife last Thursday to travel to south Asia. To Nepal and Myanmar to proclaim the good news of the kingdom.
The message of the kingdom started as a seed 2000 years ago, and it is spreading across the globe.
“The birds of the sky will nest in the branches of the kingdom.”
So what is Jesus’s point in these two parables? His point is, “The kingdom is not going to come as you expect it to.”
The Jews in Jesus’ day expected the kingdom of God through his Messiah to come abruptly and dramatically. They expected a Warrior-King to come to his throne, and through the power of God crush all the enemies like the Roman government. OT prophets clearly speak of such an outcome. In the expression, “NOW but NOT YET,” they expected “NOW.”
When Jesus declared, “The kingdom of God is near,” the people assumed it was going to happen NOW in this way. However, Jesus’ two parables here and other parables in Matthew’s Gospel tell us that the kingdom of God is coming differently. The timing and the manner of its coming is different than they expected.
For many of us today, this is not new news. It’s familiar. If we’ve read much of the NT, we know that Jesus came once, ascended into heaven, commissioned his disciples, and promised to return a second time soon.
But to Jesus’ first-century Jewish audience, this slow but sure unveiling of the kingdom of God was a radically new concept. Even Peter and the other disciples didn’t fully understand it until after the resurrection.
And so importantly, over all this unveiling of the mystery of the kingdom is Jesus’s word to “Listen.” To hear him. To have humble, sensitive, responsive ears and hearts, and welcome what he says.
Some people like Peter and a small band of disciples really did listen. They paid attention to Jesus and responded to him with faith and humility. But most people did not. They enjoyed the entertainment of miracles. The spectacle of the large crowds. But they simply didn’t believe what he said about the kingdom of God.
So how should we respond to Jesus’s words from these parables
Patiently believe
The parables encourage patient faith. We can be patient and have confidence that God will accomplish what he desires. The kingdom will grow. Yes, the world is falling apart. Yes, we wonder where the Lord is in our suffering. Yes, we wonder why he doesn’t put a stop to all the darkness around us. But the seed of the kingdom will grow and is growing. And the harvest really is coming.
Jesus, the King of all kings, the Lord of all lords, is coming. And when he comes, all things will be set in complete order.
- Chaos will be quieted
- Darkness will turn to light
- Secret things will be revealed
- Questions will be answered
- Wars will cease
- Temptations will be no more
- Our deeds done in faith will matter
- Service for the King will be rewarded
- Longings will be fulfilled
- Tears will be wiped away
- Sorrow will be turned to joy
- The weary will find rest
- Fears will be quieted
- Death will be resurrected
The King is coming, and all things will be made right. This is our hope. Though the coming of his kingdom may seem slow and ordinary, the Lord is at work. Even in our suffering, God is building his kingdom. In Philippians 1, Paul saw how even persecution and his imprisonment was working to advance the gospel (Phil 1:12-14).
May we be forward thinking and walk in patient faith. God’s kingdom is here now, yet it is still coming.
Peter summarizes all this so well with these words:
1 Peter 1:13 CSB Therefore, with your minds ready for action, be sober-minded and set your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.
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